LOS ANGELES — Before Jordan Usher stepped inside the visiting locker room of the Gill Coliseum following the USC basketball team’s comeback at Oregon State last Saturday, he heard someone gripping a water bottle and knew what was next.

“I’m like, man, I’m about to get wet,” Usher said.

His suspicion was confirmed.

As Usher turned a corner, passing through a doorway into the locker room, he was immediately swarmed by teammates toting bottles of water and Gatorade. Usher tried to back out, but it was too late. Kurtis Shultz, USC’s strength and conditioning coach, pulled him further inside, and the players doused Usher.

“I don’t appreciate the Gatorade, but the water was fun,” Usher said, laughing about the celebration a couple days later. “The Gatorade had me all sticky.”

It was a big game for Usher, a freshman shooting guard who made three 3-pointers off the bench during a critical 18-0 run late in the second half, barreling through a seven-point deficit they faced with 8:54 left.

It has also been a big month for the rest of USC’s bench.

As the Trojans have won six of their last seven games, including four in a row heading into a Pac-12 Conference rematch against Stanford (11-9, 5-2) on Wednesday evening at the Galen Center, their reserves have averaged 26 points, about one-third of their total points in the span, a noticeable uptick.

For a comparison, over the first 14 games, the youthful bench had averaged 13 points.

Their development has helped spark the mid-season surge, leaving USC (15-6, 6-2) in second place in the conference.

Usher has dubbed them the “Bench Gang,” or, “BG.” The nickname has apparently stuck since it was first used in a scrimmage in practice earlier this month, when the reserves were matched up against the starters.

“That’s how we like it,” Usher said.

“Everybody has confidence,” Jonah Mathews added.

While Usher equaled his career-high 14 points at Oregon State, finishing 4 for 4 from beyond the arc, center Nick Rakocevic scored 17 points at Stanford, and Mathews added 11 points at Oregon last Thursday, the Trojans’ first win over the Ducks since 2009. When they ended another long losing streak to a Pac-12 foe four days earlier, beating Utah for the first time since 2013, Mathews also had 17 points, making three of his five 3-point attempts.

The scoring has come in a variety of ways.

Rakocevic has proven to be effective on the offensive glass, where the 6-foot-11 sophomore has averaged 2.8 offensive rebounds in his eight Pac-12 games, tied for fourth in the conference, and led to many of his baskets. Rakocevic has at times shouldered more minutes while forward Bennie Boatwright, the Trojans’ second-leading scorer, has experienced pain from the plantar wart on his foot.

Usher recently showed off his 3-point range but has forced turnovers too, averaging 1.3 steals in conference play to pave the way for points in transition.

Teammates often bring up Usher’s seemingly boundless energy, making it tough on opponents.

For the first two months of the season, the sophomore was starting in the backcourt in place of De’Anthony Melton, held out since he was linked in the college basketball bribery case and later declared ineligible by USC. But earlier this month, before a conference win over Colorado on Jan. 10, the starting five changed.

Shaqquan Aaron was in. Mathews was out.

Mathews took it in stride.

“A lot of dudes in the NBA or college are a sixth man,” he said, “so it doesn’t really matter to me. I want to win.”

The bench has further gelled the past four games.

Coach Andy Enfield said he liked the swap because Mathews provided “offensive firepower off the bench with his ball-handling and shooting.”

The group has so far taken pride in their stretch, one that has helped make USC look like the team that began the season ranked in the preseason top 10.

“It’s just about having depth,” Rakocevic said. “Some guys are going to have off-nights. It’s going to happen to the best of us. When guys just aren’t performing, we have to make sure that we’re up there.”

The Trojans could use their next effort against Stanford. In the past seven games, the Cardinal is the one team that has defeated USC, coming in stunning fashion on a half-court buzzer-beater Jan. 7.

Joey Kaufman is the USC beat writer for the Southern California News Group. Since joining the Orange County Register in 2015, he has also covered Major League Baseball and UCLA athletics. His work has been recognized by the Associated Press Sports Editors and Football Writers Association of America. Kaufman grew up in beautiful downtown Burbank.

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